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Thursday, August 10, 2017

NFPA: Smoking & Home Fire Safety

The place where we feel safest - at home - is where most smoking-materials structure fires, deaths, and injuries occur. Smoking materials are the leading cause of fire deaths. Smoking material fires are preventable.

Smoking Safety

If you smoke, use only fire-safe cigarettes.

If you smoke, smoke outside. Most deaths result from fires that started in living rooms, family rooms and dens, or in bedrooms.

Keep cigarettes, lighters, matches, and other smoking materials up high out of the reach of children, in a locked cabinet.

Put it Out

Use a deep, sturdy ashtray. Place it away from anything that can burn.

Do no discard cigarettes in vegetation such as mulch, potted plants or landscaping, peat moss, dried grasses, leaves or other things that could ignite easily.

Before you throw away butts and ashes, make sure they are out, and dousing in water or sand is the best way to do that.

Smoking and Medical Oxygen

Never smoke and never allow anyone to smoke where medical oxygen is used. Medical oxygen can cause materials to ignite more easily and make fires burn at a faster rate than normal. It can make an existing fire burn faster and hotter.

Electronic Cigarettes

Fire have occurred while e-cigarettes were being used, the battery was being charged, or the device was being transported. Battery failures have led to small explosions. Never leave charging e-cigarettes unattended. E-cigarettes should be used with caution.

Facts

The risk of dying in a home structure fire caused by smoking materials rises with age.

One out of four fatal victims of smoking-material fires is not the smoke whose cigarette started the fire.